In Memoriam
by Illyria Lives
Summary: He's never died before, not really, so he doesn't know what to expect as it happens, but it sure as hell isn't this.


**Massive spoilers for The Madness Underneath. You have been warned.**

* * *

When he was seven, Stephen loved race cars.

* * *

Sleep overtaking him, struggling with him, forcing him under a sheet of heavy lead, cold lead, a muffled shroud covering him, where he had previously been on fire, the best kind of fire.

He wants to scream.

Can't.

* * *

He's never died before, not really, so he doesn't know what to expect as it happens, but it sure as hell isn't this.

* * *

Callum, looking at him like he's just grown a second head.

Callum saying, "Bullshit."

Stephen calmly tells him otherwise; he tells him about ghosts that refused to die, about the special ability now housed in his eyes.

Callum looking at him again, longer, thoughtfully. He shifts his weight onto a leg that doesn't match the other in a small, important way.

Callum still says "bullshit" but now it's almost close enough to an agreement for Stephen to hope.

He's not the last one.

* * *

Water, dumped over his head, streaming down his shoulders. His sister, laughing as he sputters. He is ten years old, on holiday, and she has greeted him, sitting on the back porch, with a bucketful of water. He hates her just enough to cover the affection a little boy will always have for his older sister.

* * *

Older sister. Wise sister, fun sister. So much fun sister, party sister, lost sister, white powder sister, syringe sister, sunken eyes sister, not breathing sister, never was there sister, not talked about sister, drowned sister, lost sister, only child.

His parents give him a toy car. He never did go to the funeral.

* * *

Water. Stephen loved water.

There was water underneath a tarp in the dim interior of the boat shed. There was a rope tied to a low beam. There's a chair and there's all these creaks and moans and sounds and there's shadows and _pain _there's _pain _breaking into everything _pain _but not enough _pain _not enough _pain _it's not enough _pain PAIN __**PAIN**_**—**

Then there's a young man with a sad mouth and dull hair.

"Can you see me?" he asks.

The pain stops, somewhat.

* * *

The pain started up again in his veins.

_How long until it kills me_, Stephen thought, but it wasn't where the full force of his mind was, in his veins with the insulin that would slowly kill him, heartbeat by bloody heartbeat.

His mind is on her.

"_Rory, don't do it Rory—"_

* * *

"You don't sound crazy to me," she says.

He feels like screaming because she's not allowed to tell him that, not allowed to be that pretty, be that kind, be that brave, she's not supposed to help him, support him, he's not supposed to feel the weakness in his chest as he watches her face.

Her hand over his, on the doorknob.

She opens the door and he feels like a small child.

He drowns in his lungs as he watches her go down the stairs.

"_You don't sound crazy to me."_

* * *

A car is ahead of him, and she is inside.

"Rory," he says her name under his breath.

And then he hits the gas.

* * *

There's no pain this time.

Just a trickle of heat down his head, Rory's name on his mouth and his eyes full of her frightened face as she gets out of the car. He wants to pull her close, check her for every bruise and cut and tear that these people have done to her, but he doesn't, because he shouldn't.

The heat grows along his head and he ignores it, because there is no pain.

* * *

He knew that he should have stopped her, never should have crossed the line, but the heat in his head flooded every inch of him, condensing on the point on his chest where her hand met his skin, like a brand, like a flame, like the light of a star he never knew the name of, and then her mouth is on his even as he warns her off, tries to ward her off, but she's a curse, she's a spell and he's fallen deep, deep into her eyes as her lips move against his, and his heart, his heart beats out erratically, harmfully, his heartbeat hurts his ribs and he sighs into her mouth because it is the best pain he has ever felt.

And then Callum ruins it.

* * *

Callum looking at him. "Bullshit."

* * *

Boo and her broken leg. She gives him her best smile as he walks past her back in Goodwin's Court, fresh from the hospital.

"It'll work out, yeah," she assures him, but her smile is teary.

She misses her, too.

The fact that she noticed it bothers Stephen more than he ever realized.

Until Callum looks at him weeks later and says "five quid."

* * *

He stands, buttons his shirt, sure that it will catch fire from the heat of where Rory had pressed her hand. He hopes for a scar.

* * *

Rory's scar is sacred, beautiful. This was the scar she got by sacrificing herself, to save both him and countless others. So Stephen doesn't touch it, doesn't feel worthy, but he wants to tell her so, tell her that it's the most beautiful thing he's ever seen.

But he doesn't.

* * *

Her eyes looking out from behind the glass of the building—_it had been so long since he'd seen them—_is the most beautiful thing he has ever seen. He wants to tell her, but he doesn't, because he shouldn't.

* * *

As he leaves the room, the heat begins to leave his head.

* * *

The image of her eyes, the touch of her lips, crowds at his mind in the night as he tries to stay awake, tries to get some important work done, but the heat has left his head now and is cold, achingly cold, like lead being poured into his mind, into his eyes.

His head lays back along the headrest of the chair, eyes slipped closed under a curtain of lead that binds him, blocks him, dims everything from him but the briefest memory of Rory's kiss on his lips and he wants to scream, to _scream—_

But nothing comes.

He is cold, so cold.

* * *

His arms and legs are cold, so cold, as he swings in the dimness. Everything is fading but the fire in his throat, in his lungs, in his jaw. His eyes go teary with cold, but then there is a young man with a sad mouth and dull hair.

"Can you see me?" he asks.

He waits, watches.

And then he puts up the chair.

Stephen falls to the ground after a moment, cold all over, but for the band on his neck, alight with fire. He struggles to breathe. He can.

He doesn't want to.

* * *

Cold water, thrown over him. His sister laughing.

* * *

_Rory's lips._

* * *

He's never died before, not really, so he doesn't know what to expect as it happens, but it sure as hell isn't this.

* * *

There's a screaming of tires, of metal, of glass.

Rory's name (Rory's lips, Rory's eyes, _Rory_) is in his mouth. His foot is on the gas pedal.

* * *

When he was seven, Stephen loved race cars.


End file.
